Can Technology Promote Peace? — An Elementary Perspective

I had the wonderful opportunity to read several essays written by Grade 6 and 7 students in the West Vancouver School District about how Canadians can promote peace in the world. Our “new generation” does understand that technology can play a key role in this.

Here is an excerpt from Sayeh (Grade 7 student):

We, as Canadian students, have the privilege of being educated and the right to speak up for global issues. Therefore, we can promote peace in the world by raising awareness in nations where people cannot speak up for their rights. You might not believe it, but it’s the reaction of the rest of the world which makes these brutal governments rethink their actions. And now, the generation of youth in these suffering nations has new ways to spread their message to the rest of the world and connect to our youth through advanced technology and social media. With these new communications, learning can occur quickly and the message can be spread.

Sayeh recognizes there is much more to social media than Facebook with her
friends. She sees social media as having the power to influence change around the world.

Genevieve, (Grade 6 student) also recognizes this potential when she discussed how young people can make a difference:

How, you ask? We live in a technology generation, and we can use it! All of us can email our MP, our Premier, and our Prime Minister. We can let them know about issues that are worrying us and about what we want them to do about it. We can use websites such as YouTube to tell people around the globe about issues that we want the whole world to know about, and to get them to be concerned and help those affected. We can create websites; write blogs, or use twitter and Facebook to contact people! There are endless possibilities.

Genevieve breaks down the stereotype about how young people spend their time online. This generation is growing up recognizing they can use technology to help promote change. We are a well-educated and connected country, province and district; these students are absolutely right that we have the ability to leverage social media networking to help promote change. We have a long way to go, but with the reflective thinking of Sayeh and Genevieve, it is evident we are on our way to embedding the powerful, positive use of technology with our kids.

Thanks for the comment. We do spend quite a bit of time talking about what kids shouldn’t be doing – it is reassuring to know that many students are so thoughtful about how they should be using technology.

Chirs, as someone who believes in transformational leadership, it instills a sense of pride that young minds are thinking about issues of voice and power through the use of technology. The power to spread issues that may not be known by the rest of the world and the power to have silenced voices heard. Nice to see that social media is being promoted as a a tool to change/highlight social issues in the world and provide avenues of empowerment for today’s youth. The writings really showcase a genuine care for the world…these students should be proud of their work!

Thanks Jody. There is so much more to social media that playing Farmville and swapping stories from the weekend. It is great to see that students (and their parents and teachers) are seeing the power of social media to give them voice and help bring about change.

Steven Pinker pointed out on one of his TED Talks that peace is prevailing, and not on a decline. He then moves on to explain one of the possible reasons why peace was on a rise; he said that technology could have made it possible to share stories with other individuals, and thus rendering it to be much easier to put oneself in the shoes of another individual.

But here’s my view about technology in schools: we shouldn’t put a focus on teaching kids to USE technology. I always hear students say that school boards must include a curriculum that includes such material.

But I don’t think that’s right. I think that we should focus on getting kids the confidence to speak up.

When I was in 9th grade, I was a timid boy, and my writing was horrible. I would refuse to write anything more than twenty words. Even on non-school related topics. Even at the anonymity of the World Wide Web. It wasn’t until a high school teacher had told me one or two encouraging words that got my confidence in writing to go from just twenty or so words, to writing out paragraphs.

But what got me to be so timid about my writing in the first place?

I’m not sure. Maybe it was back in 5th grade that I was taught that you weren’t allowed to write the way you speak. Maybe it was how I would hand-in a white paper with black text in one week, then the next week, I would get back the same thing with loads of red hand-written notes with a big fat four out of ten at the top of the page.

But that’s just half of it. The week prior to the paper’s due date, the teacher had gone out on a tangent and said that if you don’t get good grades, you will end up flipping burgers as a living.

With a thought of a mediocre four out of ten not being good enough to get me somewhere bigger than a burger flipping job, I was devastated. Worse, the red markings were impersonal, and used vocabulary that were meaningless to my 5th grade knowledge. Comma splice? Run-on sentence? What did they mean?

I pretty much gave up.

It wasn’t until 10th grade that I learned that you can break the rules of grammar to get your point across with a greater impact.

I’m not saying grammar isn’t important. I think grammar is crucial if we want our thoughts to be expressed clearly. But fear — of breaking rules, thinking outside the box, and thinking critically on the topic — is what anchored me back into writing shallow texts. I got full marks for vocabulary and good grammar, but nothing on depth.

And I think that if we are to teach kids “standards” and the “what’s” of social media — things like “you’re only allowed to write a maximum of 140 characters on a tweet,” “you can do this and do that, “social media is what Libya used to successfully instill democracy”, etc — and not on the “why’s,” I don’t think we will ever see change. Maybe WHAT’s going to be taught will be different, but not HOW things are going to be taught.

I think (but not scientific) that if we teach kids social media the way we teach writing today, we’re only creating uncertainty — a child will think “maybe I’m not tweeting right,” “maybe I’m saying the wrong thing,” “maybe my use of this word is not right,” etc. Their view on what’s right and what’s wrong will only be limited to what the teacher taught and not on what an IDEAL social media update will be according to THEIR personal experience.

And with that kind of uncertainty, we will stifle the use of social media; a tool which is supposedly helping us instill peace in our world.

But those are all just what I think. I’m not an expert on education, especially not on K-12 education. And I haven’t done my research. And maybe, you guys are well aware of this “warning” I mentioned. I don’t know.

The idea that we should teach students to have a voice resonates with me. I see social media to be most powerful with young people when they realize the power it can have to give them a voice (and influence). I would agree we should not teach social media as a skill, but in the context of creating a voice. The power for students is that social media can be a megaphone for students – using Facebook, Twitter, YouTube etc. to start, spread and engage in conversations.

Of course – I also wonder if we should teach writing, as you describe – or instead teach it in more real-world contexts.